I signed up for this year’s challenge in the hope it would motivate me to more regular writing. With a number of posts written in March and scheduled for the April A-Z Challenge, it was an encouraging start. Planning was going well.
Then COVID-19 hit close to home with state borders closing which ejected us from our hazy cocoon and to make some responsible decisions. The A-Z Challenge theme went west along with travel plans as we found a place to call home for the duration.
Plans got scuppered, along with the travel theme, posts went up willy-nilly, mostly at the eleventh hour, and largely unedited. I broke rules. You know the ones: write and revisit 24 hours afterwards; edit, edit and edit again; if you’ve got ten paragraphs cull, cull, cull. No adverbs, no adjectives blah, blah, blah. Mrs Fleming, you did your best and look at what happened.
The good stuff:
- All posts eventually made it up
- Visits to QP & Eye increased with an average of 28 visits each day with the 10th April peaking at 78
- Engagement with commenters
- Visits to other participants, reading and leaving comments
The challenges:
- Moving away from the theme and not knowing from day to day what I would write about
- Lack of routine and fitting in time to write, read and comment
- The distraction of being in new surroundings
- Remembering to post links to the Facebook Group
Things I noticed:
- We can achieve way more than we think we can
- Posts written on the fly were a lot of fun and I enjoyed the stream-of-consciousness/randomness of how they turned out
- The journey is more exciting than the destination because then what.
- Kindness is the rule rather than the exception
- The tweaks make all the difference to how a post is presented and received
- I tended to stick with bloggers I have been following for some time as an opportunity to engage in a more meaningful way
- As in previous years, the challenge always tests my endurance and perseverance
- There is always something to discover things about myself based on the desire to make it to the chequered flag
This year’s A-Z Posts are here.
So tell me, how was April for you? And if you participated in the A-Z Challenge how did that go?
queasypeasy.wordpress.com 
Linda, I loved your April posts, and so admired the way you rolled with the punches when the pandemic shutdown forced you to abandon your road trip and set up camp for the duration. You didn’t miss a beat, and managed to intersperse the more reflective posts with beautiful photos and descriptions of exotic places from your trips that were just what I needed in my relative confinement. I’m sure many other readers felt the same way.
I will continue to follow your journey with gratitude for your sense of adventure. Thank you, safe travels, and keep in touch. x J
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I loved reading your posts even though I didn’t read all of them (or nearly all of them). I agree with you about stream-of-consciousness possibly turning out great. I honestly never knew about that rule of letting your posts sit for 24 hours. What do you mean the tweaks are what matter?
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Hi Astrid, sorry for the delay; being on the road internet connectivity is a challenge. Thank you for your kind comments. The “tweaks” are the small alterations we make when we go back and re-read what we’ve put down in the initial draft. Take care Linda x
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I got through A-Z, but without following the site this time. It has proven too difficult to get A-Z Official Site to mesh with WordPress. Another blogger here: John Holton (The Sound Of One Hand Clapping) does a sort of mediation between the A-Z site and WordPress and he does a fine job. So since I didn’t sign up, I won’t be doing the Road Trip. I still found some wonderful posts to read and some new blogs to follow. Like yours! 🙂
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Hi Melanie, I agree with you about the challenges of navigating between the sites and platforms. I tried to post links onto the Facebook page set up for the challenge. I’m hoping to do better this year with the Road Trip, there are a lot of great writers out there. Thank you for the follow. Take care Linda xx
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Thanks to you, I’ve got the challenge on my April 2021 calendar! I managed NANOWRIMO in 2010, the 50,000 word novel in November, so I’m hopeful!
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That’s great Lois, lots of time of be mulling themes and post topics for the 2021 A2Z Challenge. Take care Lina x
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I like the appearance of your blog. My April was good, but there wasn’t time to read everything I’d have liked to. https://suestrifles.wordpress.com/2020/05/07/reflections-on-the-blogging-from-a-to-z-in-april-challenge-2020/
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Thank you Sue. Please you had a good month. There never is enough time is there, by the time you’ve got your head around drafts, formatting etc. However, I’m hoping to get around a few more with the A-Z 2020 Road Trip which I’m hoping they tell us about soon. Take care and thank you for stopping by to read and comment, I’m hoping to visit in the next weeks. Linda
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I won’t sign up for the Road Trip as I have failed at that quite spectacularly in the past! It might not stop me reading a few posts, though. Less pressure. 🙂
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